The other evening, my seventeen year-old niece came over to pick up a dress she ordered online from J. Crew. She has given out my address before.

Since I work from home and am around most afternoons, it’s a pretty safe bet that packages delivered here will be hustled indoors quickly and are safe from curious neighbors. Can’t say I mind the visits either.

The dress was a sleeveless number, in a wine color, short but not too short, with a surplice neckline that seemed to be inviting me to lend her my cream colored cameo again. She bought it as a bridesmaid dress to wear to her sister’s wedding originally planned for this spring.

“Try it on,” I suggested. I think she was happy to oblige. I didn’t have to ask a second time.

She emerged from the bathroom in the new dress with her back towards me, asking me to zip up and hook the top hook on the back. She looked pleased. The color complemented her skin tones and the style was sophisticated without making her look like she was trying to appear older than she was.

“It fits pretty well,” she reported.  “Maybe I’ll just have the shoulders taken up a little.”

And then I thought about all kinds of things that fit. I thought about Goldilocks and her unannounced visit to the house of the three bears; how chairs or beds can be too short or too hard. I thought about Russian matryoshka dolls, nesting dolls, and how so many multiples can fit inside a hollowed out mama doll.

I discovered there is a web page on tumblr, Things Fitting Perfectly into Other Things. It displayed a photo gallery of objects that fit into other objects. Often taken for granted, I realized how great it is that shower heads fit into stainless hooks anchored above tile stall walls, how Murphy beds fold up into walls, how pillar candles can fit into jars, how tall boxes of cereal can still fit between shelves in kitchen cabinets.

It seems like a mini miracle – when things fit. Our lives are full of complex relationships. Often, for something to fit us, some other pieces or parts have to fit each other.

Then, of all things, I thought about my car seat, how it seems to fit me. The same car seat also fits a soccer mom, a gangly teen, and a dynamo cell phone toting businessman.

Not only can car seats be moved closer or further from the steering wheel, over the years, they’ve broadened the array of adjustments a driver can make.  I can raise or lower the seat so that I can see over the dash more easily. I can shorten or extend the angle of the back support because I prefer an upright driving posture. I know some car seats can be ordered with bun warmers to reduce the dread factor involved in climbing into a car on a cold winter morning.

Maybe it’s a silly thing to get excited about, but when I think about things fitting me, I get happy thinking about my car seat.  (Did someone say road trip?)

Being able to sit for hours comfortably while moving towards a destination is no small thing.